Should Have Been
by Willow Lark
Summary: *Spoilers for The Burning Maze!* Thalia refuses to accept it. But that doesn't make it any less true. She will never see him again.


***Again, spoilers for _The Burning Maze_! Read at your own risk.***

 **Thanks to Guest, Mythical Potato, and .harris211 for reviewing DIAILY, and to everyone who followed and/or favorited!**

 **As Riordan books typically go, TBM took my heart and crushed it. As I've said before, I live for Jason and Thalia's relationship—everything about the two of them really intrigues me. I can't get enough of them! I couldn't wait for Jason to be back in the story, (more Zeus/Jupiter kids content! What could be better?) but now I'm basically a mess. This can be read as a companion/sequel to _Regret,_ but it's not necessary to read that first.**

.

.

.

* * *

Piper IMs Thalia right before she goes to bed.

Thalia is shocked that it was able to get through—no form of communication between demigods has worked for months, and she is thrilled.

Piper is a mess, both physically and emotionally. She bears the wounds of a recent battle and immediately bursts into sobs once the connection is established and Thalia can make out more of her face than a grainy blur.

Scathing looks are sent Thalia's way by the other hunters, who walk around camp attending to their nightly duties. Their expressions convey distaste for the weeping daughter of Aphrodite their lieutenant is speaking to, who is, in their eyes, weak and undeserving of sympathy.

 _(I need to pull myself together.)_

But Piper manages to collect herself, and delivers three devastating words.

 _(No.)_

Thalia remembers the first time she heard them, years ago. Her mother had thrown herself across the ground wailing at the gods, feigning grief.

Now, like then, Thalia does not believe it. She refuses to.

 _(Piper is lying.)_

 _(She must be.)_

But this time, Thalia doesn't mourn alone.

She **travels** alone, though—Artemis gives her her permission to leave her sisters for a few days to go to Camp Jupiter, but the other hunters are not allowed come as well.

 _(None of them want to, anyway.)_

Most of them scorn her, for allowing herself to be so attached to a man, albeit a brother and not any sort of romantic interest.

So Thalia Grace takes a bus to southern California. She stares out the window, furiously wiping away her tears on the journey.

When required, she slays the empousa bus driver and continues on.

Once in New Rome, she meets his friends at the funeral. With a sting, Thalia realizes that these people know more about Jason than she does.

They are the people who watched him transform from a little boy into the brave, strong, inspiring, **self-sacrificing** leader he is.

 **Was.**

 _(I still cannot accept it.)_

And, really, what does Thalia know? She raised him as best an eight-year-old could until he was two, and only met him again recently.

 _(The day he was taken away was the worst day of my life.)_

There is Dakota. There is Gwen. They welcome her quietly, and remember with choked whispers.

Countless people come up to her and tell her how much they admired her brother, what he had done for them.

Thalia hadn't realized how much Jason **mattered** to the people of Camp Jupiter.

 _(And I am envious.)_

Selfishly, Thalia had believed she had forever. She thought she would have years, thought she would have **decades** to make up for the years she missed from her brother's life.

She expected to be at his wedding and dote on his children. Bother him at work and visit him in his retirement home.

Out of the two of them, **he** should have been the one with the long life, with the family.

It is not fair.

 _(Since when have the gods been_ _ **fair**?)_

It's almost like Nico and Bianca, Thalia realizes. A tragic, terrible parallel.

Two sisters who joined the Hunt because, at least in part, of their little brothers. One, because she didn't want to be responsible for him anymore, the other because it was **all** she wanted, and what she could never have.

Two brothers who had to grow up quicker than anyone should have to because all of a sudden their big sisters were taken away.

But in Nico and Bianca's story, the sister died because of the Hunt.

In Jason and Thalia's, the Hunt is the reason Thalia lives on.

 _(I lost him once.)_

For the second time in her life, Thalia grieves over her brother's death.

And this time, he will stay that way.

 _(I lost him again.)_

Somehow, Thalia manages to survive. She goes back to the hunt, and stays sixteen for another several thousand years.

She sees countless civilizations rise and fall.

She makes and loses what feels like hundreds of friends.

She remains Artemis's lieutenant through good times and bad, wearing her silver tiara with pride and locking away the stab in her heart until the pain becomes dull, and eventually, almost disappears completely.

In time, she doesn't even remember his face very well. Only his name— **Jason**.

Until one day, when Thalia is suddenly and inexplicably struck down in battle.

The spear comes from behind—unexpected and quick.

As Thalia lays slumped face-first into the Earth, in the few moments before she bleeds out, she lets herself think of that which she has hidden inside for centuries.

For the second time in her life, Thalia knows beyond a shadow of a doubt she is going to be with her brother again.

 _(But he_ _ **wasn't**_ _dead the first time, was he?)_

Thalia cannot remember.

The three judges of the underworld unanimously send her to Elysium.

Her new home in Paradise is large, and Thalia winces. She vaguely remembers living in another large house. A woman screaming as Thalia tried to protect a toddler from getting hurt.

Soon, people come to visit her, and Thalia begins to recognize faces—hunters, **friends** who had died before her, demigods who Thalia had recently fought alongside.

Then the faces get harder and harder to identify.

 _(But I do my best to remember.)_

There is Luke, and Zoë, and others Thalia knows from her early days. She has a brief, but meaningful, reunion with each.

There is a middle aged man and older woman, a couple, who introduce themselves as Percy and Annabeth.

They knew Jason.

 _(Where is he!?)_

 _(Where is my baby brother?)_

 _(Why has he not come by?)_

 _(Where do I find him?)_

Annabeth and Percy exchange a pitying, demeaning glance, and turn their infuriating expressions toward her.

Doesn't she remember Nico di Angelo telling her? Or had it slipped from her mind after so many centuries of locking her brother's memory away?

There were so many things Jason didn't get to accomplish the first time around.

He chose rebirth.

 _(I will never see him again.)_

* * *

.

.

.

 **Please review.**

 **~Lark**


End file.
